READ YOUR BLOGS

you've all been given a list of work to complete in order that your coursework will be complete.  I'm uploading all your work on monday after school and won't accept anything new after this.  I'll look foward to seeing you tonight, tomorrow night and friday night. 

Ms G

Check out Euphoria Productions blog.  At the moment, they're not losing any marks at all.  This is your benchmark.  Well done boys.
Ms G

Hello AS level group.....

On thursday, you'll be bringing in any film that you've completed and uploading and editing as we mentioned.
PLEASE bring with you a decent amount of film that we can work with. 

You'll organise yourselves as follows:

Hyder Edit (expert) Nawzad Edit Kamran Post Production blog


Rejaul Edit Shihab,Edit (expert) Keith Post Production blog

Rashaa Post Production blog Adam Edit Rukhsar Edit (expert)

Stacey Edit Honey Edit Darine Post Production blog

Miami & Ziad Post Production Ali Edit Adnan Edit (expert)

Tatiana Post Production Hind Edit

Mohammed Post Production blog Rahil Edit Tarek Edit

Luis Edit.
 
Those of you who are experts might be called on to help other members of other groups.
Please let me know that you are on board with this .
 
Many thanks
Ms G
 

Dear AS levels,

I'm looking at your blogs now and some of them are worryingly empty.

I'll expect to see an update of everything you're doing as you go along and those shooting scripts uploaded.  Also at the least a photo of your storyboard, I'd rather we filmed it as an animatic though.  You'll all be ready to film tomorrow won't you....?
Don't make me cross, you don't like me when I'm cross.
Best wishes
Ms G

Opening Sequence Coursework Outline & Deadlines

Week beginning:

14th Jan- , Role and Importance of Continuity, Intro to Preliminary task 1 & blog. Deciding of groups
18th Jan - analysis of film openings and blog

25th Jan- Introduction to storyboarding & scripting, Planning & filming of Preliminary task 1.

1st Feb- Introduction to Final Cut & the editing process, Editing of Preliminary task 1, Class feedback.

8th Feb- Concept development, Company logo & pitch planning, Pitch & storyboard, Target audience profile.

15th Feb- Half-term- Location recce, Script completion, Personnel, props & resources identified

22nd Feb- Planning & shooting.

RESEARCH & PLANNING DEADLINE- FRIDAY 26th FEB

1st March- Shooting.

8th March- Intro to GarageBand & Soundtrack, Editing to rough cut, class & teacher feedback.

15th March- Editing, Score composition, Intro to LiveType.

22nd March- Final edits & post-production, Evaluation start.

FILM COMPLETION DEADLINE- FRIDAY 26th MARCH

30th March- First draft of evaluation.

EVALUATION DRAFT DEADLINE- FRIDAY 1st APRIL

5th & 12th April- Easter Hols.

23rd April- Feedback on evaluation, DVD Menus, burning & upload to YouTube.

FINAL DEADLINE FOR ALL WORK- FRIDAY 24th APRIL

Opening Sequence Elements

Typically, an opening sequence will contain:

• Details of cast and crew.


• The film's title.


• An introduction to character or character type.


• Indication of place.


• Indication of historical period.


• Information regarding mood and tone.


• Introduction to signature theme tune.


• Information about genre.


• Questions that the viewer finds intriguing.


• Patterns and types of editing that will be echoed in the remainder of the film.


• Mise en scene and cinematography that will be echoed or elaborated upon later in the film.

Sequence Summaries

You will have to choose from one of the following summaries for your opening sequence:

1. A crime or supernatural thriller
2. A teenage, romantic comedy
3. An urban, social realist film

Evaluation- Extra Information and Advice

Have a look at the the extra information and advice on here to help you successfully address each question on the blog and in your PowerPoint presentation.


1. In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products? Compare and contrast your own sequence and one which you think has generically influenced you.

2. How does your media product represent particular social groups? Take a still of one of the main characters from your film and one from a real opening sequence that you think has similar representational issues. Compare and contrast these.

3. What kind of media institution might distribute your media product and why? Analyse your own production company (including the logo) alongside another company that you think would distribute similar films.

4. Who would be the audience for your media product? Look at the BBFC website. Which classification criteria do you think would be most appropriate for your film and why? Also mention your audience profile and have one or two key ideas about who your target audience is.

5. How did you attract/address your audience? Use four stills from your sequence and identify how the micro features (such as costume, location, camera shot etc) attempt to engage your target audience.

6. What have you learnt about technologies from the process of constructing the product? Include screen grabs illustrating the equipment and software you have used. What did you learn about using each of them?

7. Looking back to your preliminary task, what do you feel that you have learnt in the progression from it to the final film? Include a still from each project. What technical and analytical skills have you learnt from the first project to the second?

Evaluation questions

These questions need to be answered in draft on your blog and in your PowerPoint presentation:

1. In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?
2. How does your media product represent particular social groups?
3. What kind of media institution might distribute your media product and why?
4. Who would be the audience for your media product?
5. How did you attract/address your audience?
6. What have you learnt about technologies from the process of constructing the product?
7. Looking back to your preliminary task, what do you feel that you have learnt in the progression from it to the full product?

How to improve your blog.

To improve these further you need to add some more elements.

Try to add some/all of these:

• Animatic of your storyboard (video or slide show).
• Your production logo from LiveType.
• Choice of fonts for titles, with reasons why.
• Examples of songs (embedded as YouTube video) that offer a similar vibe to what you want to create.
• Stills from other films that you have taken inspiration from, perhaps particular scenes or characters, with reasons why.
• Stills of locations, costumes, props etc again with reasons why.
• A full list of titles, in order, including crew list and film title.
• A rough cut of your opening (upload when you have organised your basic order, basic titles and music). It is very important to get feedback before going on to finalise your film.

Research & Planning Guidelines

Remember that your research and planning can be in the following format or combination of formats:

• Blog
• Presentation
• Video Diary
• Interviews

And the deadline for ALL your completed research and planning is FRIDAY 27th FEB.

Your research and planning should include:

• Details/record of all the work that you have completed, including all the planning, filming and editing of the preliminary task, work on the pitch, logo, location scouting and all other aspect of research and planning that you have undertaken.
  
• Analysis of up to 5 openings of films from your chosen genre, uploaded to your blog (and a minimum of 2 in detail!).
  
• A completed storyboard and script (final draft versions)
  
• A fully realised production logo, constructed on the computer.
  
• A completed & filmed pitch, covering all the areas outlined previously.

The Pitch

The pitch is a vital part of any film making process. It is the time when an idea is sold to investors and for many film makers, how good (or bad) their pitch is what makes or breaks the film being produced.

With this in mind, you need to think about, plan and work on your pitch very thoroughly and make sure that it is as slick, engaging and convincing as possible.

You should aim to cover the following in your pitch:

• One line sales pitch for your film
  
• A selection of draft production logos, including the final draft-with reasons for your choice.
  
• An outline of your opening, including: plot, characters, possible locations, costumes, style/genre of score or soundtrack.
  
• A brief synopsis of the rest of the film- as if you were to make the whole film.
  
• An outline of your target audience, covering areas such as age, media interests, brand identification and lifestyle, with reasons why and a suggested certificate for your film.
  
• Details of other film intros that have influenced you in any way; from your chosen genre, and others from different genres.

YouTube Channel

Hello folks,

This is the channel on YouTube where all the videos from AS Media will be uploaded to.

It will also feature videos from the current A2, last year's AS and some of the Btec work as well.

Feel free to check these out, show your parents that you're nearly famous and to leave comments- but only constructive criticism please, any disses or silly remarks will be removed.

Just think a big, Hollywood producer could see your work and next thing you know you're a star! (Try to remember poor old Mr Hull's role in helping you get there though won't you?!)

Enjoy,

Mr. Hull

2008 AS Thriller Film Opening Sequences

Famous Examples of Relevant Films

Below are a list of famous examples of films from each of the genres that you could work in:



Crime thriller:

The Departed (Martin Scorsese, 2006)
The Usual Suspects (Bryan Singer, 1995)
Heat (Michael Mann, 1995)
Memento (Christopher Nolan, 2000)
Leon (Luc Besson, 1994)



Supernatural thriller:

The Shining (Stanley Kubrik, 1980)
The Ring (Gore Verbinski, 2002)
The Ring 2 (Hideo Nakata, 2005)
The Others (Alejandro Amenabar, 2001)
The Sixth Sense (M. Night Shyamalan, 1999)



Teenage romantic comedy:

Juno (Jason Reitman, 2008)
10 Things I Hate About You (Gil Junger, 1999)
Almost Famous (Cameron Crowe, 2000)
Never Been Kissed (Raja Gosnell, 1999)
Dirty Dancing (Emile Ardolino, 1987)



Urban, social realist film:

Kidulthood (Menhaj Huda, 2006)
Adulthood (Noel Clarke, 2008)
Life & Lyrics (Richard Laxton, 2006)
Somers Town (Shane Meadows, 2008)
Nil by Mouth (Gary Oldman, 1997)

Example of Opening Sequence Analysis

In order to analyse the opening sequence of Juno (Jason Reitman, 2008) I will look at the different micro elements and try and establish how they are used to set up character, narrative and genre.

The music chosen for the opening sequences is by anti folk artist Kimya Dawson. It is evocative of Bob Dylan and helps to establish the low key feel of a US independent - on which the film was successfully marketed. The lyrics tumble along in the style of a quirky, downbeat love song listing partnerships like ‘if id be a tree you would be my leaves’, this helps set up the character of Juno as both innocent and pensive, alluding to the search for romance and the coming of age story that follows.However I feel that it is the mise en scene that plays the most important part in establishing the tone and genre, as well as the lead character in the film. Juno is depicted walking through suburban USA, shiplap houses and mail boxes set up her small world in which the local shops - the guitars shack, beauty parlour and drug store - are the dominant features and from which the park represents a temporary break for reflection. The leaves falling form the trees show time passing and establish the time of year – this will become important when Juno gets pregnant. She passes an acoustic guitar and a retro TV that reinforce the teenager’s interests.

Juno’s costume acts as a kind of timeless unisex teen uniform; blue jeans, sweat top and canvass shoes. It indicates to us that she is perhaps a bit of a tomboy but neither extraordinary or pretentious. The sunny delight carton she is drinking reasserts the bland diet of the mid American teen. The college team that jogs past at the start and end of the sequence further set us in the teen world and act as a contrast to Juno’s lonesome figure.

The animation technique of rotoscoping (tracing over live action filming) suits the US independent style by alluding to independent comic books like American Splendour. It technique allows the director to simplify and mute the colours, making it graphically pleasing as well as mundane. The unfinished drawings also build on a concept of an almost incomplete environment. Some interesting slide and push edits also allude to comic books. Juno s character is sometimes on the screen in two different shots and this along with her constant presence and dominant framing establish the centrality of her character within the film. Some of the more adventurous camera angles, for example the overhead shot, are pleasing to the eye.

Of course the key function of a title sequence is as a vehicle for the main credits. In Juno these are brought in as neatly hand drawn three dimensional block letters, continuing the comic theme and not unlike a teenagers graphics project or doodling. An effect has been used that keeps the titles wobbling slightly in an organic way. The titles are framed thoughtfully to balance with the framing of the subject and many are brought onto screen from behind bits of the set or are integrated into the scene. An example is a title that appears painted on the fence by using perspective. Juno also walks in front of a number of the titles. These techniques are satisfying for the viewer and help integrate the title sequence into the film.

The Shining (Stanley Kubrick, 1980)

The film opens with a series of shots of panoramic landscape vistas showcasing the bleak desolation of the snowy mountainous surroundings, which will provide the backdrop for the film’s subsequent narrative developments. Various birds’ eye view shots intermittently cross dissolve into one another, and depict an expansive clear blue lake, a snow-capped mountain range, and a densely populated forest of evergreen trees. The camera moves swiftly through its surroundings in each shot, sweeping past the breadth of the natural environs below it, and thus conveys to the audience a sense of the massive scale and large land span of the location depicted.

During the camera’s continual movement, it occasionally captures its views from distorted angles, which undermines the idea otherwise created by this series of shots of the benevolent purity of natural beauty and the wintry American landscape. It thus uses spatial manipulation to contradict the principal connotations of the images of nature captured in these shots, and hence foreshadows the heavy deployment of themes and imagery centred upon the supernatural that will follow.

Also indicative of this theme is the use of slow, sombre, unnerving and deliberate electronic music, which in conjunction with the seemingly oppositional images suggest a malevolence to the surroundings shown and imply an unknown danger amongst them.

Eventually the camera finds a road snaking through an aerial shot of a thickly forested area then picks out and follows a lone car in extreme high angle long shot, making its way along the road. The camera gradually moves increasingly closer maintaining its birds’ eye view position, but also gradually rotates to distort the angle and create a sense of unsettling foreboding in the manner described above. A series of shot changes track the car’s journey and depict a range of different natural backdrops indicating the traversal of time and space. As the camera finally tracks speedily in to a mid shot of the car from behind, revealing it to be a yellow Volkswagen Beetle, credits rise up through the frame from below in blue typeface, and each gives way to the next, departing the frame by rising out of it.

The moving camera overtakes the car and veers away to the left, aerially crossing country before again finding the car and tracking its journey, once again with another series of extreme high angle long shots, while the eeriness of the electronic score continues to aurally unsettle the viewer.

The camera’s point of view eventually shifts to depict an extreme long shot of a remotely located building amongst the mountains, trees and lakes. It slowly circles the building, getting gradually closer. This building is the Overlook Hotel, and will be the yellow car’s final destination, and the principal location for almost all of the film’s subsequent action.

Overall, the opening sequence has been gradually building up to this elaborate establishing shot of the hotel, and has served to highlight its isolation and remoteness and communicate an implication of danger, that the audience should by now have associated with this idyllic yet spectral location and its backdrop.